[HN Gopher] CATL's Sodium-Ion Battery
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CATL's Sodium-Ion Battery
Author : simonebrunozzi
Score : 62 points
Date : 2022-11-26 08:25 UTC (14 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (medium.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (medium.com)
| noipv4 wrote:
| How easy is it to obtain sodium from common salt?
| the_sleaze9 wrote:
| Maybe we could even convert existing mcdonalds locations into
| battery-swap and electric vehicle charging stations
| isoprophlex wrote:
| Take the salt, heat it, run current through it. Sodium vapor
| comes out.
|
| Not exactly "easy", but self-contained. From an environmental
| point of view sodium is absolutely brilliant compared to
| lithium. Everyone with access to sea water can produce almost
| 400 g of sodium from 1kg of common table salt. No lithium
| mining needed.
|
| More info: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downs_cell
| nagisa wrote:
| NaCl is not an applicable source material for these batteries.
| Na2CO3 is going to be the it, for better or for worse.
| scythe wrote:
| Mostly because mining trona (actually Na3H(CO3)2*2H2O) is
| cheaper than the Solvay process. It's not a matter of
| possibility, it's just the path of least resistance.
| throwtheacctawy wrote:
| hunglee2 wrote:
| There is no way that CATL is going to escape the US policy of
| suppressing China's technological development. Batteries are
| going to follow SC's - very likely next in line - and Tesla's
| reliance on CATL batteries is the weak point upon which Musk's
| empire will fall. Destroying CATL will probably set back EV
| adoption by some years, replacement suppliers will surely be
| built if industrial policy continues to be applied
| entropicgravity wrote:
| Chemistry will not be determinant regarding which battery
| technology will prevail. Cost will be primary and endurance
| will be next. Tesla's 4680 (yes, it's a can, not a chemistry)
| automated manufacturing technology will be hard to beat in both
| cost and endurance. And it's just at the beginning of the
| learning curve of the manufacturing tech. Competitors will have
| to be prepared to shell out plenty of cash to keep up. Hard not
| to notice that even Panasonic would not commit to 4680
| manufacturing at scale until they could confirm that Tesla's
| dry anode tech was viable.
| fnordpiglet wrote:
| Any references towards US policy against CATL? Most battery
| producers build plants in the local region anyways.
|
| Surely you don't think China has been a fair partner in
| technology and business? That perhaps the Chinese state has
| conducted systematic espionage to favor its local industry
| development, mandated technology transfer for market access,
| established unfair trade policies to favor local business
| development, and suppressed the success of foreign investment
| that was purchased at the cost of aforementioned technology
| transfer?
| dzhiurgis wrote:
| You can bad CATL and Tesla can continue to serve remaining 90%
| of EV market
| Tade0 wrote:
| I've been following the developments around this chemistry since
| the time Tiamat announced their sodium-ion battery and it appears
| that in this case it's not all sunshine and rainbows:
|
| https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-11-06/catl-s...
| throwtheacctawy wrote:
| adrian_b wrote:
| Maybe CATL will not be able to deliver what they have promised,
| but that article is just a piece of garbage that does not prove
| anything.
|
| I could not read it on Bloomberg, but the same article seems to
| be also available at:
|
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/energy/are-investors...
|
| The article begins with a photograph of "A CATL battery pack on
| display at the IAA Transportation show in Hanover, Germany, on
| Monday, Sept. 19, 2022".
|
| The article does not say whether the pictured battery pack is
| one with Na-ion or just some random battery pack that does not
| have any relationship with the article.
|
| If the battery pack displayed at Hanover had been a Na-ion,
| then it would have been weird for CATL to show it if they had
| discovered problems that would have prevented its production.
| Also, the article says that CATL have announced last month
| again that they will start the production in 2023. It would be
| weird for them to discover just now problems that have not been
| discovered earlier.
|
| After this introduction, the article says repeatedly that
| despite what CATL hoped, the Na-ion batteries are not good, but
| then the article fails to provide even a single logically-
| coherent sentence that says what exactly is not good about
| them.
|
| Until anyone else provides some real information about what
| might be wrong about the CATL Na-ion batteries, this Bloomberg
| "analysis" can be safely ignored.
|
| There is no doubt that the Na-ion batteries can work fine at
| energy/mass ratios somewhat lower than lithium-iron phosphate
| batteries.
|
| CATL claims that they have found some means to increase the
| energy/mass ratio to a value intermediate between that of LFP
| and that of lithium-nickel/cobalt batteries.
|
| It is possible that whatever they have done could affect
| negatively other battery parameters, but with the possible
| exception of the lifetime, such problems should have been
| identified much earlier and CATL should not have continued to
| say that everything is on track, so even as a rumor report that
| lacks any concrete information the Bloomberg "analysis" looks
| more like wishful thinking than like anything plausible.
|
| The few numbers given in the "analysis" are wrong. It is said
| that Na-ion would need an 8 times increase in energy density,
| which is a claim that would be valid only about the ancient
| lead-acid batteries. Na-ion needs only a 2 times ... 2.5 times
| increase in energy density to become competitive in
| transportation applications.
|
| There is some nonsense claim about Na-ion batteries "in certain
| formulations", which, even if it were true, would say nothing
| about the CATL batteries, because those do not use those
| "certain formulations", whichever those might be.
|
| I have rarely read any article so illogical as this one.
| tschesnok wrote:
| Why does the article do a head to head comparison between the new
| battery and a "generic" Lithium battery.. and then later we see
| the specs of the Tesla battery and it is just about identical
| with the new battery.. but you know.. more energy dense and in
| production. The differences seem to be more in the rounding
| range. Sure.. twice the milage.. but show me a car where this
| matters past 500k. Always clickbait.. Now compare this to some
| Tesla battery still in R&D...
| benj111 wrote:
| true but if youre going to compare anything to a musk product
| in R&D then it should probably be cold fusion anti grav cars.
| rini17 wrote:
| If they plan large scale as soon as next year, then some physical
| specimens should be available already. Are they anywhere?
| adrian_b wrote:
| Sodium-ion batteries with lower energy/mass ratio, but with
| high endurance and low cost, which are suitable for stationary
| applications, like storage for solar energy, are already
| available commercially.
|
| Googling finds on-line offers for 48-V, 2.5 to 10 kWh batteries
| at an energy/mass ratio of 89 Wh/kg (a similar battery with
| lithium-iron phosphate has 133 Wh/kg), i.e. a little less than
| half of what CATL is claimed to have achieved.
|
| It remains to be seen whether the claims about CATL are true,
| but the difference between what is claimed and what is already
| available is not so large as to make the claims incredible.
|
| For stationary applications, the sodium-ion batteries already
| seem a good choice, due to the much lower price than even the
| lithium-iron phosphate batteries, which have very similar
| specifications but seem to be 7 to 8 times more expensive.
| jimnotgym wrote:
| The weekly HN 'new battery chemistry will solve all worlds
| problems' story.
|
| I will believe it when I see it
| auscad wrote:
| CATL is the world's biggest EV battery manufacturer, and
| they're planning to mass produce these batteries in the next
| few months. This isn't your run of the mill university research
| press release.
| chris222 wrote:
| You can already buy these cells in home sogens starting early
| next year.
|
| https://www.bluettipower.com/pages/ces-2022
| fbdab103 wrote:
| I do not care for their promo graphics of 10kwh sitting
| exposed alongside the exterior wall. Were I in a position
| to be constructing a battery backup, it is going to get its
| own dedicated concrete shed, separated as far as possible
| from the house.
| simonebrunozzi wrote:
| It would have been nice if you did read the article before
| commenting. You might be right about HN and battery articles,
| most of the time, but in this case it's quite a credible
| technology and manufacturer.
| throwaway294566 wrote:
| Yes. My question is always "show me the shop where I can buy
| it". Never an answer ;)
| api wrote:
| Lab bench to product can be 15 years or more, so doesn't mean
| it doesn't work.
|
| The other hard thing is beating Li-Ion. It would have to be a
| lot better or cheaper to beat the economy of scale. Just a
| little better won't displace the incumbent.
| zeristor wrote:
| If you can't get the Lithium it'll have a chance. Lithium I
| believe is quite common, it is just increasing supply could
| take several years.
| chongli wrote:
| That's the thing: Lithium ion batteries are not a fixed
| technology, they're a moving target. They've evolved
| dramatically and encompass many different chemistries since
| they first appeared in the lab in the 70's. But since
| they're all grouped under the name "Lithium ion" people
| just think of them as a fixed, static, mature technology.
| nicoburns wrote:
| That's true, but sodium ion batteries are also not a new
| technology.
| chris222 wrote:
| Bluetti (maker of sogens) will be using these cells early
| next year.
|
| https://www.bluettipower.com/pages/ces-2022
| sudosysgen wrote:
| CATL doesn't do retail, but you might be able to preorder a
| sample.
| 404mm wrote:
| I'm more worried that $5k savings per EV will translate to $500
| per EV for the end customer. More than anything, I welcome the
| switch away from lithium for both economic and environmental
| reasons.
| benj111 wrote:
| In the short term maybe. Long term lower prices means more
| sales -> more economies of scale -> lower prices.
|
| So long term I would expect more savings not less.
| caycep wrote:
| I think one underlying current is market prediction - i.e. if
| CATL's solution is more widely available as a supplier to the
| larger market, will they eventually "TSMC" Tesla's battery
| tech?
| nharada wrote:
| Any battery experts have opinions on this chemistry? My
| understanding is that CATL is a fairly established operation and
| far along in development -- what are the remaining risks in using
| this chemistry?
| tuatoru wrote:
| Little is known about CATL's secret sauce. But several other
| groups have been working on other Na-ion chemistries, mostly
| for stationary storage which has bigger market potential if the
| price is right.
|
| Faradion is working on Na-ion for India's vehicle market.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium-ion_battery#Commerciali...
| ZeroGravitas wrote:
| Paywalled, but CATL already make 1/3rd of all EV batteries,
| including some to Tesla. Tesla's main supplier, Panasonic only
| supplies 9% of global demand so the framing of this as a threat
| to Tesla is weird.
|
| The US willingly gave up any chance to lead on this tech (and
| several related areas) to China, to slightly prolong their
| hydrocarbon industry. An obviously bad decision for multiple
| reasons.
| fnordpiglet wrote:
| Another reason is relatively lax environmental laws for rare
| earth production and electronics manufacturing. Interestingly,
| to your point, fracking and other hydrocarbon production
| techniques, are at least as bad if not worse but seem to get a
| relatively free pass.
|
| That said the advent of a sodium ion technology that's
| practical at scale opens the door for competition by decoupling
| rare earth production from battery costs. Local rare earth
| saves on tariffs and transportation costs. Sodium earth makes
| it a raw technological affair and the west is still leading in
| technological innovation. Manufacturing is already globally
| spread out for battery production, so raw cost of labor must
| not be a primary component of cost.
| Tade0 wrote:
| The last chemistry to use rare earths at scale was NiMH, the
| "M"(metal) being Lanthanum - also used in catalysts in the
| oil industry.
|
| Li-ion batteries generally don't contain rare earths.
| fnordpiglet wrote:
| My bad. I'm better at programming.
| vinaypai wrote:
| Right now any framing that somehow involves sticking it to Elon
| Musk guarantees clicks.
| throwawaymaths wrote:
| Sodium ion is a better fit for houses and grid storage than
| vehicles or consumer electronics.
| tuatoru wrote:
| Building (house, commercial building, factory) and grid four-
| to eight-hour storage (stationary storage) is potentially a
| much bigger market than vehicle storage, espcially as processes
| that now use carbon-intensive fuels are replaced.
| Zigurd wrote:
| China is an immense market for lower-cost EVs. They also do not
| have as far to drive as most Americans. This battery tech could
| be less suitable for the US than China and still have an
| enormous market.
| thechao wrote:
| I suspect most Americans don't drive as far as Americans do.
| I've got a hella commute & it's only 21 miles, each way.
| Getting to my parents is 55 miles. My in-laws are 205 -- but
| stop for lunch _anyways_.
| chris222 wrote:
| It's not the average drive. The p95 will be a lot higher in
| North America than China or Europe. Theres also elevation,
| winters and our obsession with going 70-80mph on highways.
| akira2501 wrote:
| Obsession? The higher the speed the greater the capacity
| of the road, and when freight has to travel 2000 miles by
| road, the 10mph/h difference makes a considerable impact
| on the time. Isn't it the case that Germany completely
| removes speed limits for some portions of it's
| "Autobahns?" What "obsession" drives that decision?
|
| There's this assumption that all the negative qualities
| of road are down to malignable user behavior issues. It's
| an unusually hostile way to view the problem.
| tuatoru wrote:
| > The higher the speed the greater the capacity of the
| road
|
| This is false[1]. Stopping distance increases as the
| square of speed, and therefore safe following distance
| also. This and other effects mean that 80 mph is well
| down on 30 mph.
|
| Theoretically capacity should be independent of speed[2],
| but in practise it seems to decrease at high speeds
| because most drivers are careful.
|
| 1. Plot of safe capacity vs speed:
| https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Safe-road-capacity-
| for-c...
|
| 2. https://civilengineering-softstudies.com/57-traffic-
| capacity...
| fnordpiglet wrote:
| Presumably you say that due to energy density. However it
| discusses that in the article. You're invited to read.
| throwawaymaths wrote:
| Yes, they are comparing currently available lithium tech to
| unavailable sodium tech even though lithium is hardly fully
| optimized. It's certainly the case that sodium development
| benefits from decades of lithium research
| tromp wrote:
| Given that sodium ion is claimed to
|
| - charge twice as fast as lithium ion
|
| - have double the number of charge cycles
|
| - cost substantially less
|
| - be substantially safer
|
| - and more environmentally friendly
|
| I think it would be the clear preference for all but the
| highest performance vehicles.
|
| Note that Tesla is also trying to reduce cost in moving to 4680
| cells [1]:
|
| > the main reason Tesla is using 4680 batteries at the moment
| is to cut manufacturing costs, rather than any of the other
| pie-in-the-sky advantages announced on Battery Day a few years
| back.
|
| > A Model Y's 4680 pack, for instance, is US$3,600 cheaper to
| manufacture than one with 2170 cells, but even then Tesla is
| only halfway through with the cost reduction potential of the
| new technology. It has yet to master and scale the dry-coating
| cathode method which would bring the pack's cost down US$5,500
| compared to the 2170 battery.
|
| [1] https://www.notebookcheck.net/Tesla-4680-vs-2170-battery-
| cel....
| throwawaymaths wrote:
| The assumption there is that lithium is fully optimized. It's
| not.
| cogman10 wrote:
| Granted, but lithium has also had a significant amount of
| additional R&D, particularly in manufacturing.
|
| Time will tell if sodium batteries can be competitive, I
| don't know that it's clear yet.
| throwawaymaths wrote:
| Lithium and sodium are similar enough that it's hard to
| imagine that some of the learnings from lithium haven't
| translated to sodium.
| quonn wrote:
| Comparing to LFP the advantages are not that big. It might be
| cheaper and scale better. Charging speed is now mostly
| limited by public charger speed and good enough. I expect
| sodium batteries to have a big impact in cars that cost 25k
| or less.
| adrian_b wrote:
| The only significant advantage compared to LFP appears to
| be the price.
|
| However the price advantage is more than enough. After a
| short googling, it appears that I could buy right now a
| battery large enough to supply the energy for one day for
| my house (5 kWh), either as sodium-ion for $650 or as
| lithium-iron phosphate for $5000 (with very similar
| specifications for endurance and size).
|
| The former I could buy at any time, for the latter I would
| have to save money for some months to be able to afford it.
| That is a large enough advantage.
| quonn wrote:
| Yeah, I'm talking about car batteries.
| scythe wrote:
| That LFP price can't be right. That's $1000/kWh!
| Batteries have been cheaper than that for at least half a
| decade. And I'm pretty sure Na-ion (at room temperature)
| hasn't even hit the market yet! Googling "sodium-ion
| battery price" just gave me textbooks.
| adrian_b wrote:
| I believe that there might be cheaper LFP, that is why I
| have written "after a _short_ googling ".
|
| $1000 per kWh was the first price that I have found for a
| 5 kWh LFP battery and I am lazy now to search for a
| cheaper one, so this is a real price, even if it is
| likely not the best price.
|
| For a much larger battery, a quick search shows EUR 20000
| for 50 kWh, i.e. EUR 400/kWh (though this price is older
| and now it might have increased). It is normal for the
| price per kWh to decrease at very large capacities.
|
| Also, the fact that LFP were cheaper than this a decade
| ago is irrelevant, because googling about their price
| finds that "lithium prices have surged over 700% since
| the start of 2021, which has led to a big jump in battery
| pack prices" (written in May 2022).
|
| However, Na-ion batteries for solar energy storage have
| certainly already hit the market, e.g.:
|
| https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/SUNPOK-48V-5kwh-
| Sodiu...
|
| EDIT: After an extra search, I have seen an offer for a
| LFP 5 kWh battery @ $2000, so it looks like the $400/kWh
| price is available for lower capacities too.
| Nevertheless, this price is less reliable than the higher
| prices seen initially, because it is only for some kind
| of pre-order with unknown delivery time.
| guerby wrote:
| 5 kWh LFP battery with BMS and user servicable rack
| format from a reputable brand in the USA is $1,649.99 so
| $330/kWh, see here for example:
|
| https://www.currentconnected.com/product/sk48v100/
|
| You can easily find other brands for less than $300/kWh,
| and plenty of review/teardowns on youtube.
|
| Edit: adding "Typical capacity at 80% DOD @.5C Rate is
| over 7000 Cycles" so if you bring your battery to 7000
| 80% cycles at 0.5C you got 28000 kWh out of it, so 0.059
| USD/kWh out of the battery (and you still have 4 kWh
| usable in the battery so many more cycles).
| adrian_b wrote:
| Yes, that is a good price, but AFAIK all the US prices
| are quoted without taxes, to make them seem smaller,
| unlike in most other countries, so with taxes included I
| assume that the real price is about $400/kWh, which
| matches the price that I have found meanwhile for a
| similar battery in UK.
|
| Therefore, the current price for Na-ion batteries is only
| 3 times less than LFP (the endurance and lifetime are
| claimed to be about the same for Na-ion and LFP).
|
| Still, this price ratio of 3 remains a significant
| difference and it is very likely that in the future the
| price of Na-ion will decrease at a much higher rate than
| the cost of the mature lithium-based batteries, when more
| manufacturers will begin to make Na-ion batteries.
| tuatoru wrote:
| > cars that cost 25k or less
|
| In other words, most cars.
|
| "Americans remain resistant to the lure of EVs, which are
| still unaffordable": https://arstechnica.com/cars/2022/11/o
| nly-1-in-3-americans-w...
| tromp wrote:
| Taking out the lithium seems a rather big advantage.
| Anyway, it's good to have two promising alternatives to Li-
| ion, both of which are clearly superior for home use, and
| likely for affordable, smaller range EVs as well.
| zeristor wrote:
| There are some larger charging stations with large battery
| banks that can store enough electricity for fast charging.
| quonn wrote:
| It's more about being able to deliver it when many cars
| are charging. Charging speeds go down considerably. I
| typically don't get the maximum possible speed and often
| am far off and sometimes that depends on the number of
| cars charging.
| chris222 wrote:
| Your actual limitation when the site is full is usually
| the utility transformer. Tesla have been installing many
| 8 stall and even 12 stall sites with 750kVA pad
| transformers.
|
| If they had a Tesla Megapack as a buffer for example the
| transformer wouldn't be the bottleneck as the output is
| greater from the Megapack.
| CyanLite2 wrote:
| Same article from Dec of 2020. Lots of promises, but no tangible
| product.
| metadat wrote:
| Can you provide a link to corroborate this is the typical [sad]
| battery vaporware?
|
| I'm searching but haven't yet found the goods.
| fnordpiglet wrote:
| The article links to an article from 10/22 stating they filed
| with regulators intent to produce in 2023, a year they've
| been promoting for at least three years so seems a fairly
| reliable indicator of ability to produce.
|
| https://www.caixinglobal.com/2022-10-25/catl-aims-to-mass-
| pr...
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